The regular monthly meeting of the Troy Irish Genealogy Society
was held on Thursday, August 25, 2005 at the home of Bill and Cathy
McGrath in Clifton Park NY. The following individuals were in attendance:'

The meeting was called to order at 7:55 p.m. by
Donna Vaughn, President. Donna welcomed Doris Moak and Janice Sullivan
to the group.

A motion was made by Donna Vaughn and seconded
by Lizette Strait to approve the minutes of the July 21, 2005 meeting.
The motion passed. The minutes have been published on the TIGS website.

REPORTS

There was no report from the President. Donna thanked
Bill and Cathy for hosting the meeting at their home.

The Vice President, Kristin Ayotte, was unable
to attend the meeting.

Rick Shea, Treasurer, reported that there are currently
twenty-one (21) paid members. Donna asked Rick to put a notice on
the list regarding dues. The members discussed ways to encourage
members to become paid members of TIGS. Jeanne Keefe will develop
something for the website in this regard.

Webmaster, Jeanne Keefe, discussed the new setup
for the TIGS website. The members all voiced their approval and
noted that it is now easier to navigate the website. Jeanne has
“cleaned up” the rootsweb files. Several people have
responded to her request to send an e-mail address or word document
to attach to their entry in the surname list. Jeanne pointed out
that charts, photos, etc. can be attached to the surname entries;
if they are mailed to her, she would be glad to put them up on the
site. She will send out a message to the list notifying everyone
that surnames without information attached to them will be dropped
from the site.

The members discussed a suggestion from Joan Howe
that photos be published on the list and members invited to help
identify individuals in the photos. The members agreed that this
would be a good idea and Jeanne will implement it as soon as possible.
Periodically, a different photo will be published and input requested.
The results will be published on the site and another photo will
be published. Jeanne invited any suggestions for additions to the
website. Donna Vaughn asked if the “resources” section
of the website could be broken into different categories. Jeanne
will look into it and see what can be done.

Lizette Strait reported there are currently 115
individuals subscribed to the TIGS List; seven in Digest mode. She
is working to develop a master list of e-mail addresses of list
subscribers.

OLD BUSINESS

The Rensselaer County marriage index project was
discussed. Jeanne Keefe met at the Rensselaer County Clerk’s
Office with several volunteers to develop a system to copy the marriage
index records. Problems were encountered in interfacing the laptop
computer with the scanner and the Photoshop program. Jeanne has
determined what the problem was and will develop a set of instructions
and meet again with the volunteers. She noted that saving the scanned
copies as PDFs allows copies to be enlarged up to 200%. Bill McGrath
noted that this is a very big project and it will require many volunteers
and suggested that help be requested from individuals outside of
TIGS. The members agreed. There are at least 30,000 entries which
work out to 60,000 names; the bride’s name and the groom’s
name would appear in the spreadsheet with a corresponding file number
to match them up to the original record. Volume 2 appears to be
missing, but Bill is hoping that it turns up once the project starts.
Only the marriage index books will be copied. The index leads to
the marriage record book which contains valuable information; e.g.,
address, age, occupation, names of parents, birthplace of parents,
etc. The index has just the names of the couple and the date of
their marriage.

Bill McGrath reported that the 1902 City Directory
project is going well.

Lizette Strait shared a draft copy of the tri-fold
booklet that she has developed that includes a bio of the TIGS organization,
information about joining the list and the organization. The members
thanked Lizette and agreed that the booklet looks good. Lizette
will fine tune the booklet to include some suggestions made by the
members. Bill McGrath asked that information be included indicating
that the research projects done by TIGS members is not restricted
to Irish names but to all nationalities who resided in the Troy
area.

Mimi Nicotina reported that she has spoken to Ruth
Sweet from the Troy Public Library and she was receptive to being
a speaker at a TIGS meeting. Donna Vaughn suggested that the meeting
could be held at the Library and Ruth would be able to show attendees
the resources available in the Library. Mimi will speak with Ruth
and determine if she would be available for either the September
or October meetings.

NEW BUSINESS

A new project for TIGS has been suggested by Joan
Howe. She has come into possession of a book published in 1925 entitled
“History of Troy and Rensselaer County NY” containing
biographies of prominent people. There is extensive information
included about each of the people. The members agreed that this
is worth looking into as an addition to the TIGS website.

Donna Vaughn asked if it is possible to add drop-down
menus to the opening page on the website. Jeanne Keefe will check
into it.

During the open genealogy forum portion of the
meeting, Cathy McGrath, showed the members a unique sterling silver
coated wine bottle which was a wedding gift from the priest who
married her grandparents in 1914. The bottle was found in poor condition
and almost disposed of; Cathy and Bill had the bottle cleaned and
learned its history. She also shared information from the Rensselaer
County marriage records for her grandparents. The record provided
the name of the priest who married the couple, the names of both
sets of parents, and the middle name of the grandfather previously
only known as “R”; it was “Robison”.

The next meeting of TIGS will be held on Thursday,
September 15, 2005. The site for the meeting will be determined
later depending on Ruth Sweet’s availability.

Jeanne Keefe has a CD of the 1859 Troy City Directory
and offered to do lookups. The members discussed the idea of putting
one or more TIGS projects on a CD and offering it for sale as a
way to raise funds for the organization. This is something that
will be discussed in the future.

ADJOURNMENT

A motion was made by Donna Vaughn and seconded
by Lizette Strait and Mimi Nicotina to adjourn the meeting. The
motion was approved and the meeting was adjourned at 9:15 p.m.